Somewhate irrelevant if their intent is to sink the ship and do...

Somewhate irrelevant if their intent is to sink the ship and do a private deal with the chinese I'd say. If these guys had even the slightest bit of integrity they would rescind this allocation as a statement to S/H's that they admit they have not earnt these based on the non-delivery of the long list of promises they have made to the s/h base. 

I'd say we've got as much chance of seeing that happen as we have them ever finding anything of value in their mining activities - this just going from bad to worse and then some......